


Incorporeal

by Largho



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe, Book - Freeform, Darkfic, F/M, Short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:19:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26835070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Largho/pseuds/Largho
Summary: The rain pounded down. Entombed in an iciness I cannot fight, my senses long departed, I can only observe as a familiar ethereal figure approached the figure lying still on the bed. E/C. Darkphic.
Relationships: Christine Daaé/Erik | Phantom of the Opera
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own none of the characters presented here nor the story from which they were from.
> 
> This is born from a sudden inspiration during a thunderstorm, brought to life by my recent reading of the macabre.

The rain beating down on the windows with a ferocity that I have not witnessed before. The deafening pound and crash of the storm were all that my senses could make out. The entire atmosphere of the room thick with sorrow, the heaviness crushing. The darkness engulfed me. But one thing overpowered all. Complete, unbearable cold; frost from the inside out. It was so much that I was numb. I cannot open my eyes. I had forgotten how to feel and see, yet I can hear everything around me with an intensity almost akin to touch. I can envision everything around me with perfect clarity. Every sound as tangible as it could have been were it physically embodied. I feel it; every squeak made by mice, every crash made by thunder, every bash made by the rain to the windows, unyielding and unrelenting. To feel, yet not to really feel. To see, yet not to really see. A terrible trap created only by this force field of cold. Icy water streaming throughout my body. My blood may have turned to ice and it would not have been different. The clothes I have on give neither comfort nor heat.

The sound of the door opening and the floorboards creaking under a weight revealed the presence of someone else. The light footsteps that made they're way to where I was would have been inaudible were it not for the constant creaking of the wood that signified the approach. It was a woman, I could tell. The light brushes of her hand on her tearstained face. Her blonde hair pale as the lightning struck once more, proceeded by the inevitable crack of thunder. Her long, white satin dress gave her a look of the supernatural. Her face was ghostly; so unbelievably pale. She seemed familiar, yet she was not at all. I never knew that pale face, maybe in another life, but not this one. Maybe she was a ghost; come to haunt me in this eternal winter hell I. "By all means," I would have said, "take me now. End this suffering."

The figure made her way to me; so careful in her approach, she was. Alternatively wiping her face and wetting them once more with the tears that fell. Her sobs were quiet, soft, but they were not entirely nonexistent. Her ever so pale face was hauntingly beautiful; a ghost in a shell of a woman. Her features, once bright, were now dull and bland; she had seen better days. She was young, maybe in her early twenties; barely in the prime of her life, yet had the eyes of one who'd lived a thousand lives.

I could see her, hear her, feel her presence in the room all without having to use my senses at all. Strange, this whole experience was. The storm was still raging, relentlessly beating down on the windows and the roof. The battering of rain on the windows did not cease, but to my heightened senses, it did not muffle the tracks of the young woman.

Her shaking form came ever so closer to where I laid. Her hesitance was clear when she was just a foot away from where I was. I could see now; I could see her gazing down at me, tears still sliding down that pale cheek. Her hands were clenched in fists at her side, one holding what I assumed as a handkerchief.

Her features were strikingly similar to that of whom I had a connection long ago. That unnatural beauty that seemed to weep for me. The reasons for this I will never quite know, yet it sent daggers to me, impaling whatever I had left of feeling.

Another deafening crack from the sky and she was on her knees, her hands folded as if in prayer. Her slight figure was on the floor beside the bed where a man was rested. The room was unnervingly still, but her sobs echoed throughout the chamber, being overpowered only by the downpour.

I wanted to reach out to here, but I still could not move. My body would not be willed to. I could only watch as she tremored with each gasping breath. I felt her pain, the pain too much to bear. This woman who I don't recognize was giving me pain beyond what I thought possible. Oh, this agony was only being numbed slightly by the cold. I wanted the icy clutches to take me now fully. An eternal wintery hell would have not contended with the hurt that radiated from this woman.

Leave me! Leave me now you damned creature!

Release me from the torture of your cries and tears!

"Oh, my love," she said, barely over a whisper. "Too soon, it was too soon…" Her hands took that of the one laying motionlessly on the bed, whose features I can no longer recognize.

How cruel this all was! What have I done to receive such suffering? This unearthly girl comes to torture me, while I watch her grasp the hand of the lover who so pained her. The man on the bed, in particular, was still, clothed in luxurious garments that barley hung on him. His face was in the shadow.

The ethereal creature raised the one in her grasp and kissed each long digit, one by one, and repeated this process with the other. This painfully slow process twisted the dagger already deep within me. How I wished to make this all disappear!

No more, I'm begging you. Please!

She did not hear me, nor did the greater force at work. I was still crushing under the melancholy, drowned by the unrelenting beating of the storm, and twisted and ripped apart by this woman's whimpers.

If I thought it couldn't get worse, I was soon disproven as the creature then wailed her horrendous cry.

"WHY? HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?"

This is what ultimately broke her, flinging herself on the figure on the bed. Each beating of her fists on his unmoving chest brought another wave of agony rushing to me. I would not bear this any longer. No. I could not.

LET ME GO. PLEASE, DON'T HURT ANY LONGER.

She was still. I was still. The room hung heavy with a feeling indistinguishable to me. She raised her head, her pretty little head, and leaned towards that of the stock still man; taking her time kissing the exposed skin, ruined and even paler than she was.

"We couldn't have known," the smile she had on was a far call than what she was just moments before. "Oh, my dear," she leaned down once more on him. "We could have been so happy. We were so very happy. These past weeks have been heaven on earth for me." Her fingers made small circles on his still chest. "I wish we had more time…"

Her hands made their way to his once more and held them tightly. How content she looked at that moment. Her swollen eyes held a glimmer that was not there before. Her golden tresses splayed out around her, reflecting the light from another bolt of lightning from the outside forces.

She then sat up, placing something from her finger on the nightstand. She then carefully pulled open the little drawer and brought to her a little vial. Looking down at the body beside her with a longing gaze, she downed the contents with one brief motion. She put the empty vial back in the drawer and shut it as if nothing had been changed at all.

She shifted her position so then she was fully on the bed. She laid down once more beside the figure. "What is time worth to us when we have the whole of eternity ahead. Rest well, my dearest."

Turning her head to kiss him once on his mangled cheek, she closed her eyes, held his hand, and like her lover before her, was lost to the icy clutch.

It didn't hurt anymore. The pain was long gone. I had never felt so free.

I stood, facing the once living. The air had gotten lighter, and I felt a presence beside me. An ethereal creature in white, with long golden hair, stood by me. I was not alone. Not anymore.

Time had been forgotten, and so we left it all behind. The room once filled with sorrow, the bed that held the angel and the demon. And beside the bed, on the nightstand was nothing but a mask and a single golden wedding band.

And to the darkness I departed, the flaxen-haired beauty at my side.


	2. Exordium

We were so happy. Life finally seemed to turn in my favor as she had agreed to be mine forever, to have her by my side as my wife. Oh, she chose me, she said. Me! Over that damned boy, who was only moments from death in the room of mirrors. I let her go, let her run off with her precious boy, yet she chose to stay. She shed pretty little tears on her pretty little face. The dear, sweet girl refused to go, telling me she made her choice with me; that her heart and soul would forever be entwined with mine. Oh, sweet, obstinate Christine! The foolish girl knew what horrors awaited her, yet she clung to me while I, too, wept with a fervor that defied all physical possibilities. I said I would never leave her; no, I was not wrong. I would not trade her for any of the finest treasures. She was mine, all mine, and I am hers, mind, body, and soul.

It may have been hours we both sat there on the fine rug in the Louis-Philippe room, the Vicomte forgotten. What became of him in those hours of bliss was no matter to me. The Daroga, the old fool, must have escorted him out. No matter, Christine did not seem to care, and neither will I.

We married the next day.

A small ceremony in the cover of night with only the priest and God as witnesses.

The elation of the first weeks of blissful marriage carried me to the conclusion that we would no longer inhabit the belly of the Parisian Underworld. A flower, especially that as beautiful yet fragile as my dear Christine, needs the light of day. She insisted we need not move; that she would be happy wherever we stay, even underground; but I would not yield. When I told her I had bought a small flat above, she smiled very prettily and she kissed me! Her lips were ambrosia, and I was the mere, weak mortal who happened to grace in its sweet flavors.

The move was tedious work. Moving furniture from a house in the middle of a lake aboveground is not a simple task, yet within a few weeks, it was finished. I do admit, shopping with Christine was one of the more enjoyable moments. Like a child shopping for toys on Christmas day, Christine jumped from one store to the next leaving me trailing behind in my disguise. Though she could have whatever she wanted, she still sought my approval for every item; not that I would have denied her anything she chose to acquire.

It was on a particular day we went out again to obtain minor finishing touches that I noticed distance in her usually cheerful demeanor. My coaxing her to an explanation was futile, and our walk was taken in silence. I trailed behind her at a respectful distance, but soon lost sight of her. This was an unusual occurrence, as she always made sure I was behind her. I cursed myself for letting her out of my sight and quickly went to look for her.

She was easy enough to find.

It was where she was that made my heart stop.

I quickly tore her away from the dealer. She struggled, but I did not release my grip until we made it back home.

Her struggling ceased as we entered the flat. She was silent, and so was I. After an eternity, I had asked her what she bought. I knew what it was before she had taken it out of her pocket.

Poison.

I thought she wanted a quick escape; that she wanted nothing more than the sweet release of death. What a fine actress she was, I thought. To pretend to be happy with me, only to kill herself, for what gain, I did not know. I berated her, yelled, shook her until all she could do was fall on her knees. She was still silent. This was the first and only time I lashed out to my wife.

It was only after I had composed myself that she explained.

My death, she said, was her greatest fear. She knew I was no young man. She knew of my hidden conditions. The pain, she said, of losing me was too great. The poor girl then cried. Weeped right there on the floor. I, too, cried for her pain is my own torture. Once again, it was on the floor our emotions poured. It was when exhaustion took over her that I carried her to bed.

We did not speak of it the next morning, nor the days following.

I did not question her nor told her I knew she kept that damned bottle of death in the bedside table. No, I would not spoil the girl's happiness, for it was very much improved on the morrow. I will not break the spell so fast.

The next week, our little home was complete. Everything was settled, and I was the happiest of men.

We both didn't anticipate the moment my heart would fail and I would no longer exist in this plane of existence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do hope that was, in the very least, entertaining. Thank you for reading.


End file.
